


In All Its Grandeur

by elissastillstands



Series: The Sky Above, the Sea Below [1]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: F/F, Meet the Family, Pre-Canon, Pulau Langkawi, Shenzhou Era, Shore Leave
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-05 16:18:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14048100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elissastillstands/pseuds/elissastillstands
Summary: Shore leave in Pulau Langkawi. Reflections on water and sand; change and closeness told in seven parts.





	In All Its Grandeur

**Author's Note:**

> They sit on the beach, walk in gardens, meet the Georgiou family, go swimming, listen to music, dance, have dinner, and eat breakfast in bed. There is not even the faintest pretension of plot. 
> 
> The characters are not mine; Star Trek does not belong to me; I own nothing.
> 
> This is nothing short of fluffy, plotless, unadulterated self-indulgence, sprung into being at 3 am after the finale aired and forced tooth and nail into something resembling cohesion because it simply would not leave my head. nomisunrider's requests for more Burnham/Prime!Georgiou a while back also spurred me on.

“Captain—” Michael starts.

“Michael, what did we say about calling me that?” Philippa turns around and looks at her over the top of her sunglasses, and the corners of her eyes are crinkled in amusement. 

“That addressing each other with our ranks is unnecessary and even inappropriate to the situation, given that we are on a romantic shore leave together.” Michael holds Philippa’s gaze—the captain has been Philippa in Michael’s mind, ever since Michael decided to see their ship as something other than metal debris kept afloat by sheer dint of sentimentality—for a beat longer than necessary. She is only barely mindful of the fact that the two of them are standing in the middle of the boardwalk, and that people are parting and flowing around them like the seawater surging up along the shore.

The sea still astounds her, with its immensity and brightness. Vulcan is a desert planet, and though she had stayed for some time in San Francisco for her duties as part of Starfleet, the sight of the plains of shimmering water never fails to take her breath away. It is one thing, to know that 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered with water, and that the ocean accounts for 96.5% of the earth’s water content, and that this simple compound of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom is vital to all multi-cellular life indigenous to the planet, in all its myriad forms, and it is another to see it, the vast and shining blue. 

This particular blue is all the more vibrant and striking to Michael’s gaze because it is the blue of Philippa’s home, and these are the shores which she saw as she grew from child to captain, and in the moment of pause between answer and response, it occurs to Michael that it only makes sense that Philippa came from this beautiful place. She can see the shimmer of the waves in the bright warmth of Philippa’s eyes, and she sometimes feels the same intensity of awe looking at her captain as she does when she looks at the ocean, because Philippa’s presence seems to her as all-encompassing as the grand waters which embrace the world in its entirety. 

“Well then, Michael—shall we?”

It takes Michael a moment to realize that Philippa had spoken, another to recollect her thoughts from their distractions, and her eyes are bright from Philippa’s gentle smile against the backdrop of the glittering sea and ringing clear sky, and her tongue feels clumsy against the roof of her mouth. She does not know the exact context for Philippa’s question. The Standard expression “shall we?” refers to a previously suggested action, and there had been no such suggestion, and there was once a time when she would have asked for clarification while internally cursing the vagueness of everyday colloquialisms, but Michael feels no need for clarification now. 

“Yes,” she says—yes to it all, to the sea still strange and astounding to her, to the heat and still clarity of the sky, to the curve of Philippa’s lips and the warmth in Philippa’s eyes, and Michael can feel her own lips stretching in a smile. She holds out her hand to the other woman, her palm outstretched and open to the sky, and Philippa covers the hand with her own, and Michael luxuriates in the skin warmth, the feel of their palms and fingers sliding together and then settling, joined. 

Philippa resettles her sunglasses on her nose, and the two walk onto the beach, hand-in-hand. 

===

Michael blinks at the frothy drink which had appeared in her field of vision. “What—?”

“It’s hot milk tea,” Philippa says.

Michael wonders where Philippa found a warm drink. The day is hot enough for the sunlit sand to be uncomfortable on the soles of Michael’s feet, if she were to step out from the shade of the umbrella. Ice is not a commodity on Vulcan—there is not even a word for it, outside of transliterated Standard—and all the drinks there are served warm. Michael remembers Amanda indulging in cold drinks from time to time, but she herself had found the traditional hot teas more than adequate for all her years on the planet. During her first weeks on the Shenzhou, Lieutenant Detmer had introduced her to iced tea after they completed an observational mission to a planet with average temperatures exceeding 309 K, and she had taken a polite sip and then waited until all the ice melted before she finished the drink. 

Michael stares at the hot tea in front of her for a second longer before reaching up to take it. “Thank you, Philippa,” she says, inclining her head. She takes a sip from it and catalogues the flavors: the bitter bite of the black tea, tempered by the rounded sweetness of milk and sugar. The liquid is foamy and thicker on her tongue than she is used to, likely from the condensed milk.

Philippa’s smile is soft and fond. “You’re welcome, Michael.” She sits down next to Michael on the reclining bench. Their knees touch, a point of warmth separate from the heat of the day.

Michael’s eyes settle on the opaque pinkish liquid in Philippa’s glass. “What are you drinking?”

“Sirap bandung; a mixture of ice and sweetened condensed milk, flavored with rose syrup. I haven’t had it since—my cousin’s wedding, I believe.” Philippa takes a long pull from the straw and stills for a moment, looking contemplative. “Not quite as I remember, but it’s good.”

Condensation is beginning to bead on the glass. Michael watches as a droplet runs down the smooth surface to the crease of Philippa’s forefinger and wonders what that must taste like, the combination of milk and roses and ice. The foods of her childhood are a blur to her; Vulcan cuisine is vegetable-based and prioritizes simplicity above all else; Starfleet replicators are primed for standardization. This is something entirely out of her experience. Michael has seen planets formed and stars born in the depths of nebulas; she rarely consumes new things, and never has she drunken of flowers. “May I try some?” she asks.

“Of course,” Philippa says. She holds out the glass in Michael’s direction. 

Michael leans in close, close enough to feel the feathery touch of strands of Philippa’s hair against her cheeks, and takes a sip through the straw, steadying the glass with a hand on top of Philippa’s. The taste of the drink blooms across her tongue—cold and creamy, sweet and heady. Philippa is watching her intently. Michael draws back, but allows her hand to linger a moment before lowering, coming to rest on Philippa’s knee. She fights the urge to look around, to observe and catalogue and analyze the reactions of others, to be wary of showing too much. 

This is a beach, Michael reminds herself. This is a beach, and they are on shore leave. There are couples all around, and there are drinks made from flowers, and the water is wide and blue. She allows her hand to settle more firmly, and Philippa presses her knee against Michael’s palm.

“It’s pleasant,” Michael says, a smile stretching the edges of her lips, “though I still maintain my general opinion on cold beverages.”

“Yes, I remember you telling Detmer that you find the act of chilling a brewed drink eminently illogical.”

“Perhaps not eminently so. I can see that they have some merit, now.” Michael glances away from Philippa as she drinks from her own cup, watching the people milling about on the sand. 

What is the worth of all her xenoanthropology textbooks if they leave her unmoored in a situation so simple as this? She can dissect Ferengi trade alliances and understand the historical significance of any one of a hundred Betazoid aphorisms. An afternoon on the beach should be effortless, in all meanings of the word—the point, as she has been informed many times, is to be at ease. But being at ease implies some sense of belonging in one’s surrounds, and she—Michael glances down at her white t-shirt and light blue pants, which she had before deemed sufficiently informal for the occasion—she does not belong. She cannot even understand the base appeal of beach apparel, beyond perhaps the pleasing aesthetics of the clothing. There are shirts which twine around torsos like vines, fabric curling leaf-like, clinging to bodies in seemingly clever elision of the law of gravity. Michael had grown up on a desert planet; the idea of being so exposed to solar radiation and sand for no apparent reason strikes her as eminently illogical—nay, perhaps even incomprehensible.

But all the people on the beach are talking animatedly and laughing as they brush sand off of their calves, unified in their exuberant happiness and the impracticality—illogic—incomprehensibility of their clothing. Is the incomprehensibility in their actions, or hers? 

“Isik for your thoughts,” Philippa says from her side, and Michael can hear the smile in her voice.

She snorts under her breath. “I fear I’m overdressed for this particular situation—” Michael trails off the rest of her statement as she turns around and catches sight of the other woman. 

Philippa is pulling her white shirt from her shoulders and tucking it away into the bag at the side. Michael cannot help but be fascinated by the subtle motion of her arms as her fingers maneuver the fabric, and the flexing of muscles in her calves and thighs as she angles her body to the sun. It’s a swimsuit, Michael tells herself, a navy blue swimsuit with sleek lines and simple design, and the elasticity of textiles meant for use in aquatic environments usually results in form-fitting garments, and there should be nothing so—so striking about it, and she and Philippa have changed together plenty of times, so there should be no reason for her to feel so stunned, for her eyes to linger for so long on the curve of Philippa’s shoulders and the lines of her legs—is it the blue of the swimsuit? is it the sunlight which is making her so radiant? is it the—

“See something you like, Michael?” Philippa asks.

Here, then, is the appeal of beach apparel. 

“Philippa,” Michael finally manages to say, “you—you’re beautiful.” She can feel a flush of warmth creep into her cheeks, and her free hand is toying with the edge of her shirt, thumb rubbing along the fine stitches of the hem.

“As are you, right now and always,” Philippa says lowly, and a distant corner of Michael’s mind is marveling that she has learned to parse the morphology of one human’s emotions so well that she can see Philippa’s face shift from flirtatious to reassuring the moment she senses Michael’s uncertainty, the nuances in her expression minute but profound.

Michael nods once, unsure of what to say in response, and her eyes flicker to meet Philippa’s for a moment, unguarded and grateful, and her fingers stop fidgeting because she knows Philippa, knows that Philippa’s regard will not waver because Michael prefers to drink hot tea regardless of the outside temperature and wears t-shirts and long pants to the beach. She is emboldened enough to lean forward and murmur, “And you do not play fair, either, Captain.”

“No,” Philippa says, and her demeanor has changed again—not fickle, never fickle but rather, fluid, constantly shifting but never untrue—voice deliberately playful, and then one of the corners of her lips curls, turning her smile into something closer to a smirk. “I play to win.”

Michael feels a smile breaking on her face—as if she can expect anything less, from one of the Academy’s most notorious tactics instructors. She nestles against Philippa’s side, fully intending to stay there until the other woman grumbles that it’s too stiflingly hot to cuddle, and she finds that she is engrossed by the smallest of motions Philippa makes, down to the furling and unfurling of Philippa’s fingers as she perches her sunglasses on her nose and picks up her sirap bandung, taking a long sip. After a moment spent watching, Michael feels under the bench for her PADD with her free hand and picks it up, brushing off the grains of sand which had migrated all over the screen. 

“That had better not be work,” Philippa says, not even looking in Michael’s direction.

Michael rolls her eyes, halfway through pulling up the latest report from Proteus IV. As if the first officer has any time to cease completely from her duties, shore leave or no—

—then again, the captain is right in front of her, determinedly doing nothing. Michael pauses for a moment and then dismisses the report, pulling up her library of classic literature instead. She rests her head on Philippa’s shoulder and begins to idly flip through the titles, enthralled by the sheer novelty of the notion of an afternoon with nothing to do, unspooling before her with all its potential.

The next day, Michael steps out onto the beach once again in a t-shirt and light pants, and she smiles in anticipation of a sun-drenched day. The sea in front of her is a silvered plain of blue under the broad arch of the sky.

===

They take an old-fashioned elevated rail transport from their beachside lodgings to Pekan Kuah. _The scenic route_ , Philippa had called it with a laugh. _I normally just take the transporter to town, but I think you’ll like this more_. Michael stares avidly out the glass window at the treetops below. The transport moves slowly enough that she can almost make out the individual leaves on the trees. The forest is sprawling, enormous, seemingly as ancient as the earth and the sea itself.

“I read that all of those trees were replanted less than a century ago,” Michael says, voice half-hushed. “It looks like they’ve always been there—this forest is huge.”

“When I was child, the trees were smaller. There are pictures—paper pictures, if you can believe it, not holos—of my grandmother standing in front of her house, and the mountains behind her were nothing but concrete and steel.” Philippa props her chin on Michael’s shoulder and stares out at the view. The reflection of their faces in the glass is blurred and indistinct, the ovals of their faces so close so as to be joined. “They are Kuah’s pride and joy. The forest was completely cut down to make way for commercial development in the 22nd century. Kuah reached its peak as a commercial hub and then fell into sharp decline thereafter, until there were all the initiatives to bring back the trees. Now, we are at the forefront of environmental regeneration research.”

“There was a multi-system study about eco-integrative accelerated arboreal regeneration we had to read at the VSA. The Malaysian rainforest unit was the example from the Sol system.” Michael looks back at the serpentine curve of the elevated rail, weaving through the trees. “It’s—” she trails off, wondering why descriptors such as innovative, or well-executed, or even the phrase “a scientific marvel” seem so small and inadequate, when looking out at the rolling glory of green under the bright dome of the sky, “—beautiful,” she decides at last, turning to meet Philippa’s gaze.

From so close a distance Philippa’s eyes are honeyed and warm. She brushes her hand over Michael’s knuckles, her touch feather-light. “Yes,” she says, “it is.”

They disembark from the rail transport in the central square of Pekan Kuah. The buildings soar around them, grand trees of metal and glass breaking forth from the earth and shooting upwards, beckoning Michael’s eyes to follow the sleek lines up to where they vanish from the distance. Holosigns light up along different skyscrapers, announcing transport arrivals and projecting directions to local landmarks in three regional languages and two of the most common Federation system languages alongside the usual Standard. The ground is partitioned by fabricated stone paths cutting between gardens and fountain pools, and flowers are blooming all around, like color scattered by a painter's brush. Michael catches a gasp in her throat as the Standard hour is announced and sheets of water cascade from the upper stories of the central building and ripple through the air, filling the space with the sound of falling water. On the roof of the building, a golden statue of an eagle stands, silhouetted against the glare of the sun.

“These flowers, I’ve never seen anything like them,” Michael says, reaching towards one of the pale pink flowers in the plot next to her.

“They were declared extinct in the 21st century and reconstructed from samples in 19th century botany collections. All of the plants here are like that.”

“That’s incredible,” Michael murmurs. She looks with wide eyes at the gardens in the square, and at the people rushing by them, bustling past revenant blooms which could each be deemed a miracle.

Philippa laughs fondly as Michael drags her around to each of the small gardens, meticulously reading the placards for all of the specimens. Philippa points out for Michael the buildings she knows from childhood: the Federation embassy, tucked away in a corner of the bustling square, the Yong Mun Sen Center for the Arts with its elaborate cornices, the Al-Hana Mosque with its sleek cupolas and textured opaque glass walls, the food court on the fifteenth floor of the Awang skyscraper, which was where she had tried Rigellian-fusion bar food for the first time and regretted it thoroughly.

“I lived here my whole life, until I left for Starfleet. My family has been here long enough to see the fall and rise of the forests,” Philippa says, leading Michael to an apartment complex a few blocks removed from the crowdedness of the square. The building looks older than the others, but is no less fascinating—the overhanging eaves are slightly curved, lending a feel of upwards lift to the facade. “They're very excited to meet you, but still rather upset at me for booking hotel rooms instead of staying with them the whole time.”

Michael snorts quietly, remembering her hurried attempt the night before to memorize the names, faces, and key characteristics of Philippa’s extended family. She had gotten as far as learning that Philippa’s youngest sister is a bioresearcher with a proclivity for fostering geckos that had gotten too old for her lab before Philippa turned off her PADD and told her that generations of people had survived meeting their partners’ families without the aid of a learning software program retro-engineered from that of the secondary education system in ShiKahr. “I’d have felt bad impinging on your family’s hospitality for a whole week.”

“It would have killed the romance,” Philippa says flatly. 

Michael laughs a little at Philippa’s dour tone and steers her through the doorway. “It’s going to be lovely—well, I am a little worried, but they mean the best for you—”

“Michael, don’t worry. They will adore you.” Philippa threads her fingers between Michael’s and pulls her even closer. “Come now, Commander Burnham, what happened to ‘respect is earned, as is friendliness’?”

“In this circumstance, I find diplomatic niceties to be of paramount importance.”

“‘Diplomatic niceties’ is too kind a term—”

“Pippa! You’re here!” 

A blur of motion coalesces into a woman barreling into Philippa’s side. “It’s so good to see you, it’s been so long—” the woman turns to Michael, and Michael is faintly relieved that she is able to recognize the youngest of the Georgiou siblings, who shares her sister's jawline and lilting accent, before she is swept up into a tight hug, “—and you must be Michael! Pippa’s told us all about you, we’re so excited to have you here—”

“Lev, let her breathe,” Philippa says, untangling Michael from her sister’s grip. “Michael, this is Levi Georgiou, my sister and a perpetual thorn in my side. Lev, I told you, she’s Vulcan-raised, please refrain from unnecessarily tackling her.”

Michael feels herself blushing. “I’m alright, Philippa,” she says. She turns to Levi and offers a genuine, if slightly awkward, “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Levi stares at her for a long moment before smiling delightedly. “Pippa, they’re going to love her,” she proclaims, and then she sets off down the hall, tugging Philippa with her. “Tammy and Uncle Yang have been cooking all morning,” she calls over her shoulder, “and agonizing over how hard-lining a vegetarian she is. They’re scared of having the thing with Dani’s last girlfriend happen again—she was Vietnamese and a strict Buddhist and they’re vegetarian and have a proscription against onions and garlic and the like,” she says in response to Michael’s questioning look, “and Uncle Yang loves to put garlic in everything. You can eat onions, right?”

“I—yes?” Michael rushes to say, “I can eat anything, really, you don’t have to—”

“But we want to,” Levi says. She walks up to the door of one of the apartment suites and raps on it twice, shouting through the metal, “Our guests are here!”

“You’re in for it now,” Philippa mutters into Michael’s ear as she resolutely grips at her hand. 

Michael squeezes back, leaning over and brushing a kiss to Philippa’s cheek. “We’re going into this together,” she says. “I daresay that we’re both in for it now.”

They are both pulled through the doorway into the waiting crowd. A queue had formed to greet Philippa; she goes from person to person, hugging each of them tightly. Voices overlap with each other in excited polyphony— _Pippa, how have you been? Are you staying well, up there in space? How can you, with nothing but replicators? We were so worried, there was coverage of what had happened with Erixana IV down here_ —and Philippa shouts her responses over the clamor, her wide and open smile saying as much as her words. Most of the relatives refrain from exuberantly hugging Michael as Levi had; they introduce themselves to her with handshakes, after she accepts the first easily, and the occasional friendly wave.

They migrate over to the long table set in the middle of the living room and settle down into the folding chairs arranged along the sides, and Michael finds herself near the head of the table seated across from Philippa, with a second cousin named Daniella on one side of her and Philippa’s mother on the other, and an array of food in front of her she cannot begin to quantify or qualify. There are repeated assurances from multiple quarters that everything is vegetarian, and she blinks at it all for a moment before slowly taking up her plate and loading it up with a little from every dish, following Daniella and Philippa.

“How have you found Langkawi?” Philippa’s mother asks Michael as she nudges a dish of egg noodles closer to Michael’s plate. Her words are light and conversational, almost offhand. “You have seen so much of the galaxy; our little corner of the world must seem small to you.”

Michael glances down at the food on her plate—all delicious and made with her in mind, and yet unknown to her, though she has seen the collision of planets—and tries to think of an adequate answer. “No,” she says at last. “No, not at all, it’s been wonderful here. Philippa has shown me a lot.” Michael knows that those words seem too much like empty praise, for all her intended sincerity. She takes a deep breath and continues, “I’ve never been on Earth just for leave. I’ve never gone swimming before, or tried a drink made from roses, or seen trees and flowers like these. Your home—” the sea, the unending blue of the sky, the resurrected forests and their bounty of green, the graceful spires of buildings which dare to break from uniformity, “—everything is blue and green, and changing and growing, and—beautiful.” 

Michael knows that her voice has gone soft, nearly reverent, but she cannot bring herself to hide now. “It can never be small to me,” she finishes. “It is wonderful.”

There is a lull which might almost be quiet following the end of her words, and then the conversation crescendoes again, the clatter of utensils on plates and bowls intermingling with the chatter of dozens of voices. Someone pushes a bowl of curry soup in her direction, and there’s a shout for her to _try the popiah, the roll things, they're my favorite_ , and Daniella sets a little stuffed pastry onto Michael’s plate as she takes a hearty bite out of another. Philippa’s mother leans over and gently pats Michael’s shoulder, and in a low voice which carries beneath the clamor around them she simply says, “I am glad.”

Michael nods, heart in her throat, and she glances across the table and her chest feels fit to burst when Philippa winks as she raises a bowl of soup to her lips and mouths, _Brace yourself_. Her knees are pressing against Michael’s under the table, and her smile is small, but Michael sees it lit with the same sprawling light as stars.

===

The water is glorious.

Michael had been through the mandatory all-terrain survival training course all officers of Starfleet had to pass before their tours of duty, but learning how to survive in water in no way prepared her for stepping into the surf for the first time. This she knows in fact: how to swim. These she knows in theory: tidal force, gravitational fields, density and buoyancy, the composition of water and sand and salt. None of those are of any use to her as she and Philippa leave their shaded chairs and walk into the water. 

She laughs as she wades through the shallow waves, which rush around her ankles with their white foamy caps, the water pulling at her feet as it surges forwards and backwards. “It’s—warm,” she says delightedly, watching the waves part in ripples around her calves. In comparison to the heat of the afternoon, the water is a refreshing temperature, but it is still warmer than she had expected. Water has a heat capacity of 4184 joules per kilogram per degree kelvin, much higher than that of land. The sea holds onto the sun far longer than the shore.

“Michael, come on out!” Philippa calls, beckoning her from a distance away. “It isn’t very deep over here.”

Michael makes her way over to the sound of Philippa’s voice. The water slowly deepens until it covers her thighs, then her waist. She drags her hand through the surface, marveling in the feel of the warm blue rolling over her fingers. She lifts her hand and watches the light glinting on the water droplets running down her arm. The water is clear enough that she can see the sunlight dancing over the sand between her toes, transparent as glass but more forgiving. She wriggles her toes further into the grit of the shoreline, feeling it settle beneath her feet. The sea and sand feel as living things, vibrant with their own motion, swirling around her with—

“Philippa!” she half-shrieks as she is unexpectedly doused with water from behind. She whirls around and retaliates the best she can, splashing the other woman haphazardly and laughing as she tries to wipe seawater from her eyes. “Attacking without prior negotiation, Captain?” Michael asks in mock indignation, arching her right brow. “Hardly the sanctioned approach.”

Philippa’s eyes are shining. Her smile is wide and free, and her bare arms shine, water-glossed, the light catching on the suggestion of muscle beneath her skin, and her hair is plastered to her forehead. She is glorious. “You can hardly blame me for using my tactical advantage, Commander.”

The worries barely occur enough for her to dismiss them the moment she takes notice of them—is this too silly? are they too old? should decorum be pushed so far for so trivial a reason?—but the glint of sunlight on water is bright, and Philippa’s smile is brighter, unquantifiable even by the formulae for the luminosity and intensity of stars, and it is scientific fact that the human eye can only endure so much. Michael feels herself smiling, gladly and helplessly, even as she narrows her eyes at Philippa. “Well, then, Captain, since you have committed to this course of action—”

She lunges at Philippa and drags her down into the water, and they are both laughing, the sea lapping at their arms and shoulders and necks, and they are so close that Michael can feel every shift in Philippa’s body, feel her laughter as it leaves her lungs and bubbles forth from her throat full and rich, feel the give of her muscles around the iron of her bones, and she is breathless from laughing and from the lightness in her chest, and it is dizzying, to be so close and to feel so much.

“A most excellent tactical approach, Michael,” Philippa says, steadying the both of them. She tightens her embrace, one hand resting between Michael’s shoulder blades and the other on the small of her back. 

“I learned from the best,” Michael says in response, looping her arms around Philippa’s neck. 

The space between their faces is scant, and Michael closes her eyes for a moment, caught in the sensations of Philippa’s breath so close that it makes her eyelids flutter, of the beat of the sun and the press of hands on the back, of the water all around them and the sand beneath them and Philippa’s legs insinuated between her own. She opens her eyes again, and leans forward just as Philippa does, and then the space between them is none, and Philippa tastes of the sea in all its grandeur, of waves and vastness and closeness. 

_Glory_ , Michael thinks, warmth blooming in her capillaries beneath Philippa’s touch, fingers tangled in the damp curls of Philippa’s hair, chasing the taste of Philippa beneath the salt clinging to both their lips and reveling in the close press of their bodies in the eddying waters. _This is glory._

===

In a little bar in Kuah, tucked behind a comm repair specialist’s booth, Michael claps along with the rest of the audience as the saxophonist onstage bows. “That second piece was remarkable,” she tells Philippa, leaning across the table so the other woman could hear her above the sound of the patrons in the bar and the next set of musicians setting up before their performance.

Philippa grins at her from across the table. “You know, if someone told me back when we first met that you were such a lover of music, I wouldn’t have believed them.”

“We’ve been to concerts before, Philippa. We saw a Casselian opera as part of a diplomatic mission during my third month on the ship.” Michael pulls up the display on their table and flips through to the list of live performances. They are nearing the end of the night—an Andorian vocal quartet, a human trio with traditional instruments, a duet of Melian wood percussionists, and a handful of singers both human and alien have all already performed. 

“Oh, I have never presumed that you were anything less than a connoisseur of music, Michael.” Philippa’s smile is gently teasing. “But it took us almost half a year to pry out adjectives that weren’t variations on ’adequate’ and ’logical.’”

Michael feels her cheeks warm slightly, but she does not mind the flush which is surely creeping over her face. “Sufficiency and logic are both vital qualities when addressing pragmatic matters.” She presses her knees to Philippa’s beneath the table, laughing beneath her breath at the memory of her early years on the Shenzhou. “Besides, I progressed to calling things interesting and fascinating before long.”

“I think Saru almost started scanning you for anomalies that first time you said you enjoyed something.”

“I’ve always enjoyed things,” Michael says with a snort, crinkling her nose. “It’s the expression of said enjoyment I found—strange, at first.” She finishes the last of her drink. “But the enjoyment was always there. Music is one of the most respected arts on Vulcan.”

“Do you play anything?”

“Never very well.” Michael grins widely. “My brother does, though. Back when we were children, I showed him a classic Earth song I liked and convinced him to play it for his first lyre recital.”

The corners of Philippa’s mouth twitch. “What song was it?”

“‘Toxic’ by Britney Spears.”

There’s a moment of silence punctuated by the background din of the bar, and then Philippa breaks into loud, unrestrained laughter. After a moment, Michael joins in, giggling into her clasped hands. 

“Michael, how—”

Michael tries her best to school her face into something resembling stoic calm. “Well, Captain, it does require considerable technical skill on the lyre to replicate the effect of the chromatic sliding in the hook—” she breaks off, reining in her smile as one of the musicians steps up to the front of the stage and announces the group. _Later_ , she mouths, warmed by the affectionate amusement bright in Philippa’s eyes, narrowed in mock condemnation as they are. 

The musicians begin to play. Michael taps her foot along to the beat and sways in her seat, buoyed along by the melody, which is effervescent as soap bubbles and sea foam. The sound is worlds apart from the music of her childhood, but the feeling of listening to music, of sitting in an audience and being transported—that has never changed.

Music is one of the few elements of Vulcan culture which promotes emotiveness. Sarek had explained it to her brother as a conduit to voice that which could not be voiced, a tool with which to transfigure nebulous and irrational thoughts into clear and harmonious sound. No one on Vulcan ever applauded at recitals or concerts, but Michael remembers being twelve years old and watching a performance of early Reform-era canticles, and her spine had been precisely straightened and her hands clasped in her lap in a perfect mirror of her parents’ posture, and her siblings’, and that of the hundreds of people sitting in the performance hall, but she could see bodies lean forward when the singers reached the climactic heights of their arias and fall back incrementally when the voices diminuendoed to a mere suggestion of sound. All around her, the rows of listeners swayed to the music, like the tips of the sand dunes beyond the northern cliffs in the wind. Backs were loosened and hands fell lax, and in the corner of her eye, her little brother smiled, and even Sarek did not reprimand him. She tapped her foot along to the music, and there was no one who stopped her.

It was late when they left from the concert hall. A rust-tinted night had fallen, and the stars were beginning to come out over the buildings of the central district of ShiKahr, which seemed to ascend into the sky like trees of stone to her child’s eye. The wind whipped without restraint through her robes and hair, wildly, playfully, and she squinted against the bite of the air and looked up and down the main street, and she gasped when she caught sight of an electric storm. 

They were a mundane sight on the planet, the result of wind-whipped dust interacting with charged particles in the atmosphere, but it was unusual for one to arise so close to the city, and this particular specimen was magnificent. The cloud of dust was barely visible in the dark of the night, with only the wisps of rose at the edges illumined by the city lights, and the surrounding gloom made the display at its center all the more brighter. The lightning in the heart of the dust crackled, and it seemed to her to have a rhythm in its motion, a melody of whirling sand, and it was the music of the land and the sky, and Michael could not stop the exhilaration from breaking over her face, could not stop her smile. 

_Look_ , she had shouted over the wind, turning back to her family and pointing at the symphony of wind and light, _look, a lightning storm_ , and she then saw, despite all of her father's insistence on the Vulcan way and rationality and unadulterated logic, that the awe and joy writ large on her own face was reflected in his eyes.

The musicians onstage finish their piece, and Michael joins in the applause. The stage clears and folds into itself like vintage paper, turning into a small dance floor. Music begins to play through unseen speakers. Michael holds out her hand to Philippa, and the other woman takes it and tucks it to her side as they join the couples making their way onto the floor. “If I had known that you were such a fan of classic music, I would have waited for old Earth night,” Philippa says as she draws Michael into a loose embrace, sliding a hand along the small of her back. “That was Liv's favorite whenever we went here. It was Britney Spears, TLC, and Destiny's Child all night long.”

“Philippa,” Michael groans, poking the other woman in the shoulder before huffing under her breath and acquiescing to the rhythm established by the music. “You're never going to forget that, are you?”

“Why would I ever want to forget that?” Philippa grins. “Does your brother still remember the song?”

“He might admit it under extreme duress. I'll convince him to play us something, if we go.”

Michael's words linger in her mind long after they are spoken; if they go—no, when they go. The two of them sway back and forth, and though the music is not overly loud, the beat still pulses like a living thing in her ears, like wind and sand all around them. “We should go, the next time we have shore leave,” Michael suddenly declares, and they are so close that her lips brush against Philippa's ear with every syllable. 

“Go where?” Philippa asks, and Michael feels rather than hears the vibration of her words. 

“ShiKahr. You can meet my family then, and I can show you around the district. You've already met Sarek, but Amanda's been asking after you for the last year.”

“I might have already met Sarek the ambassador, but Sarek the father is an entirely different story.” Philippa’s hand comes up to stroke along Michael's back, in time with the music. Her voice is low and deep, a touchable thing. “It would be my pleasure to go with you to Vulcan. Thank you, Michael. For offering this to me.”

“If I did not ask you soon, Amanda would be kidnapping the both of us the moment we set foot on a starbase to restock supplies.” Michael reaches up and traces her fingers over Philippa’s face, lingering on the hollow of her temple, the curve of her cheek. “It’ll be—it’ll be nothing like it was yesterday. My family will adore you, but we’re not as—expressive as yours. You, Amanda, and I might be the only ones talking at the dinner table. I want to show you Vulcan like you showed me your home, but Vulcan is a heavy gravity planet, so outworlders find it hard to even walk for the first couple of days, and the atmosphere’s low-oxygen and the surface soil so high in manganese compounds that it kills most flora. There aren’t any beaches, but there’s too much sand and sandstorms besides, and when I first got there, I always thought it was sunset, because the cliffs were always red and the sky looked burnt the whole day, but I love it, and it’s my home—”

“Michael,” Philippa says softly, catching Michael’s hand in hers and placing a gentle kiss on her knuckles. “It will be my honor to go with you and meet your family. It’ll be beautiful.”

===

They have a reservation in fifteen minutes to eat on the veranda overlooking the ocean. Michael walks out from the bathroom and pauses to watch Philippa adjust her cufflinks. She faces the window, back turned to Michael, and her curls are limned by the late afternoon light as they fall around her head and over her shoulder. She is gilded by the day, her crisp white shirt and black tailored pants painted gold, and Michael pads across the carpeted floor to wrap her arms around Philippa’s waist and press a kiss to her hair, and the light is warm on her face. “Ready for dinner?” she asks.

“We should probably get going soon, if we want to—” Philippa turns in the circle of Michael’s arms and freezes for a split second, her lips half-parted in anticipation of speech. She stares at Michael, and her gaze is a near-tangible thing. “Michael,” Philippa breathes, reaching out and setting her hands on Michael’s shoulders, smoothing down the lapels of her jacket with a light, almost tentative touch. “You are beautiful.”

“Thank you, Philippa.” Michael catches Philippa’s hands in her own and laces their fingers together. Her jacket sits snugly on her shoulders, the thin replicated linen suited to the gentle heat of the afternoon. She can feel Philippa’s eyes tracing the lines of her red blouse underneath her white blazer, with its intricately detailed panels of geometric embroidery. The fabric is rich and fluid, and the color vibrant in the light. She has always liked wearing red—when she was younger, the color had made her feel as if she belonged amidst scarlet cliffs and burnt skies.

Philippa clears her throat suddenly and extricates her hands from Michael’s. Her cheeks are slightly flushed. “We should get going. I’d hate for both of us to be late to our first nice date.”

Michael laughs, half-covering her mouth with her hand. “We’ve been on nice dates before, Philippa.” 

She watches as Philippa pulls on her navy tuxedo jacket, and they both slip on their shoes at the door. Philippa crouches down to adjust one of her oxfords. “What exactly are you counting as nice dates, Michael? The time we were eating lunch together and the gravity emitters failed and I almost vomited over your boots? The time on Risa we had to rescue Detmer and Rhys from an infestation of carnivorous fungi? The time we were stranded on the ice planet?”

The thought of Cygni VII makes her cringe. “That was—admittedly less romantic than the holofilms would have me believe.”

They walk to dinner hand-in-hand. “Cut comms and a single sleeping bag in a freezing cave are the opposite of romantic. As is an impromptu jaunt in a zero-grav field, as are the blasted resorts on Risa.” Philippa’s lips twitch when Michael cannot hold back her amusement at Philippa’s miffed tone.

“Well, then. My PADD promises me that the weather for the rest of the afternoon will be perfectly balmy. The gravity here cannot be turned on or off, since this is terra firma. And I—” Michael leans in to press a brief kiss to the corner of Philippa’s mouth before walking the final few steps to the veranda “—will personally protect you from carnivorous fungi, and any other Risan perils which might arise.”

“Reservation for Georgiou, party of two,” Philippa tells the maître d', and they are lead to their table. They take their seats next to the water, with a sea breeze blowing freely through the dining area. The water below them is a shining splendor, glittering gold from the setting sun and shadowed with deep blue. “I want it to be perfect,” she admits, and her voice is pitched low, as if she were confessing something. “The admiralty has been pushing us, and the last few months were harder than anyone thought they would be. I want this to be perfect for you.”

“It already is,” Michael says. “Philippa, I’ve always known that being in a relationship with you means being interrupted by red alerts and scheduling time together between surveying missions—”

“I know,” Philippa says. “But my point still stands.”

The food starts coming to their table, some which Michael recognizes as variations on the dishes she’d encountered during her meals in Langkawi, some for which she has no point of reference. Philippa tells her about the food she knows, and together they spin theories about the dishes unknown to the both of them. The flavors bloom across Michael’s tongue—savory creams, smooth as velvet between her teeth; thin lattices of caramelized sugars and spices which dissolve lace-like in her mouth; delicate leaves of purple and green redolent with flavors she can half-place; slices of honeyed fruits and roots, bright as gems but tender. She lets out a little hmm of satisfaction as she scrapes the last bite off of her plate.

“This is all incredible,” she tells Philippa in a low voice as the next plate is set in front of them.

“I’m glad you like it.” Philippa picks up her fork and knife, analyzing the food before them. She cuts a small piece off of one of the fritters and places it in her mouth, chewing slowly before nodding in approval. “I believe this is a variation on pisang goreng. Battered and fried bananas—it was one of my favorites, growing up—and there’s some coconut sauce, and candied violets on top.”

“Bananas and candied violets,” Michael muses, taking a bite of the dessert. The batter crunches beneath her teeth, giving way to a creamy sweet center. There is a gentle spice tempering the sweetness of the dish—perhaps some kind of pepper in the sauce?—and above it all, the heady aroma of violets. “Are the flowers traditional?”

“No, decidedly not, but they’re good with the banana. I think it’s a nod to the reconstructed floral species all around here.”

“That makes sense,” Michael says, nodding. She balances a petal glittering with sugar on the tines of her fork and brings it to her mouth. The flavor of the violet on its own is wonderfully strong, with a thread of bitterness that soon gives way to a fragrant sweetness which floods her mouth.

“Do you like them?” Philippa asks.

“Quite,” Michael says. Feeling strangely bold, she scoops up the final bite of fruit and flowers and holds out the fork, offering it to Philippa. “Since it was one of your favorites,” Michael murmurs.

Philippa stares at the proffered food for a moment before her mouth curls in a small, private smile. She leans forward and wraps her lips around the fork, steadying Michael’s fingers with a hand around hers.

Night had fallen while they were eating dinner, and when they leave from the dining area, there is only a faint blush of pink along the western horizon to remind them of the late afternoon gold. A sliver of a crescent moon hangs low in the sky, touching the dark dunes of the waves. They make their way back to their room unhurriedly, pausing every so often along the boardwalk to look down at the dark sea, or up at the inky cosmos, scattered with stars like grains of sand. Michael tries to absorb every precious sensation of the moment, so as to preserve them in her memory: the playful breeze dancing around them, the muffled clack of her shoes on the planks of the boardwalk, the solid warmth of Philippa's waist beneath her arm, the lazy patterns traced by Philippa's hand over her back.

“Here we are,” Michael says when they arrive at their room. She keys in their passcode and opens the door, following Philippa through the doorway. “No carnivorous fungi. No gravity failures.” Michael is smiling, wide and happy, and when she kisses Philippa she can feel the other woman's answering smile against her own lips, thrillingly warm. “No ice planets,” she finishes when they part, and from so close Philippa’s eyes are dark and luminous, sea-shimmering, filled with open desire and affection, and Michael can feel Philippa's exhalations against her skin. This is always what begins to undo her, the irrefutable intimacy of sharing breath. 

“A miracle indeed,” Philippa says, lips trailing down to Michael's throat, and her voice is soft and heady like the flowers they had just tasted.

Michael wants to touch the sound, to roll around in the glory of it, to hoard it away like treasure and gold. Their lips meet again, and Michael runs her fingers over the strong planes of her back, savoring the rise and fall of her ribcage beneath her hands. She pulls her tighter, pulls her closer, and her movements are wild, joyous, awed, and she thinks fleetingly that she will not stop, until Philippa surrounds her like a lightning storm, and they share the same heartbeat. 

===

Michael wakens in the murky dark, pressed against familiar warmth. She instinctively glances to her right, looking for the chronometer, and the arm around her waist tightens and Philippa’s voice, sleep-muffled and soft, murmurs into her ear, “Go back to sleep, Michael.”

The room is nearly pitch-black, with only the barest strains of pre-dawn light staining the night outside. Michael thinks that she would normally be up by now, preparing for alpha shift. It feels strange to settle back into the sheets and feel Philippa curling around her, one hand on her hip, the other relaxed next to her head, fingertips lightly brushing her hair—strange, but wonderful. 

She closes her eyes, and when she opens them again, it is light. 

“Good morning,” Philippa says from somewhere to her right.

“Hello,” Michael says, sleep-mazed and content in it, twisting her head and meeting Philippa’s eyes. She reaches up a lazy hand and tangles it in the fluffy collar of the robe Philippa had donned, drawing her down for a brief kiss. 

“Will you permit us to have breakfast in bed?” Philippa asks, setting a large tray onto the sheets.

Michael tilts her head as she considers the idea. She normally never eats in bed, finding the practice too messy and haphazard for her liking. The tray has a variety of food on it—small jewel-toned cakes topped with nuts, fruit salad, little pastries with jam and butter, the French toast which is Philippa's chosen indulgence during their slower mornings, coffee creamy with milk—and warmth blooms in her chest when she sees her favored breakfast of poached eggs with roasted tomato salsa and a cup of green tea. She sits up fully, crossing her legs and settling into the mattress. “Shall we?” Michael asks as she picks up her tea, smiling at Philippa over the rim of the cup. She offers her free hand to Philippa and gently tugs her onto the bed. 

Philippa slips behind her, picking up her coffee as she nestles against Michael’s back. They sit in quiet for a few moments, basking in the bright day. Their window opens out to a glory of light, the ocean shimmering between the sand and the sky.

“I was thinking we could go to the beach, and then maybe have a nice dinner together one night,” Philippa says into Michael's hair when she finishes her coffee. “And we can visit my family in Pekan Kuah at the end of the week and stay with them for a couple days.”

Michael sets her empty cup on the nightstand, sinking down into the comforter and resting her head on Philippa's shoulder. “It's a full week of leave. Don't you have any other plans?”

“Plans? No, we're on leave. The point is not to do anything.” Michael can feel the smile on Philippa's face. “Can you imagine that, Number One? Whole days of leisure?”

Michael cannot. She truly cannot, but Philippa makes her want to try. “Well, if we're on a leisurely romantic shore leave, _Captain_ ,” she says playfully, planting a kiss on Philippa's chin, “addressing each other by our ranks seems unnecessary and perhaps even inappropriate to the situation.”

They slowly finish their breakfast, tangled together in the late morning light. Seven days of water and sand, of flowers and forests and open, shining laughter. Of all the things Michael has ever done, this is still among the strangest, and anticipation is coiling in her stomach at the prospect of experiencing the unexplored—but there is no rush, she reminds herself. Perhaps she will finish the Proteus IV report, and take five whole days to do so. Perhaps they will go to the beach later today—or instead, spend the day in bed, looking out over the water. The possibilities stretch out before her, trivial and still somehow grand, and she settles back against Philippa, content in that moment simply to be.

Outside the window, the day is bright over the vast and shining blue.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so, so much for reading! All and any feedback is welcome. This is the first fic I've ever posted, and the first I've ever actually completed. I guess that's what these characters motivate me to do.
> 
> Okay, so I know that Michael's adolescence on Vulcan was undoubtedly angst-ridden in canon, and I know that one of the approximately two things we know about Philippa's life before Starfleet is that she had known great loss, but I wanted to focus on different facets of their stories. The show is pretty relentless with loading up on emotional turmoil, and I desperately need Michael to be happy on a beach, supported by people who love her, comfortable in both her humanity and her Vulcan upbringing, and for Philippa to have, you know, a past and a family and actual character dimension, so we're leaving it at that. I haven't read the novels, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that this fic contradicts the backstories provided in them. I'm also ignoring the whole "there's no religion in the future thing" because that's bull.
> 
> Heartfelt gratitude to Ari for being my beta. This story was written with "How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful" by Florence and the Machine on repeat. It was very much inspired by nomisunrider's amazing "Across the Stars," and y'all should go read that immediately if you haven't yet. They have the credit for the headcanon that Philippa gets space-sick in zero gravity.


End file.
